Lobbyists call, schools close

Posted by R. Neal

From the Atlanta Journal Constitution (free registration required):

Just hours before Gov. Sonny Perdue decided to close public schools to save fuel, industry lobbyists met with top administration aides to suggest sacrificing the school days to make sure farmers in South Georgia had enough diesel fuel to harvest their crops.

[..]According to the summary, which was e-mailed to the governor about noon on Sept. 23, the lobbyists said closing schools would save about 225,000 gallons of diesel a day. Perdue cited that figure at a 4 p.m. news conference to announce that schools would close to conserve fuel. The three industry officials named in the memo were Ric Cobb of the Georgia Petroleum Council; Jim Tudor, lobbyist for the convenience stores; and Roger Lane of the Georgia Oilmen's Association.

Dan McLagan, the governor's spokesman, said the e-mail memo had nothing to do with Perdue's decision. Staff members met with the governor about 1 or 2 p.m. that day to discuss options, and McLagan said he's not even sure the governor saw the summary of the conference call before making his announcement.

[..]Department of Education officials met with members of the governor's staff the day before the decision was announced but recalled no talk of closing schools to save fuel, according to department spokesman Dana Tofig. The fact that buses use 225,000 gallons of fuel daily was mentioned at the meeting, Tofig said.

[..]At the time Perdue made the decision, his staff said the governor was told diesel fuel supplies might be within days of running out as Hurricane Rita approached the Texas and Louisiana coastline. That could have left school buses and children stranded without warning.

The whole school closing thing was a nice but mostly empty gesture, and apparently caused inconvenience for many parents. What I don't get is that if the fuel was really needed to harvest crops why not just say so? Seems to me trading a couple of days of school for a crop harvest, assuming that was the only option, would be the pretty obvious thing to do. Why deny it now? And if it wasn't the reason, what was? Regardless, that stuff about school buses and children being suddenly stranded was over the top.